The Locket
by TheCrazyOne2.0
Summary: When Harry was seven he found something precious, something important to him, something he needed, but someone else needed it more. One-shot


Okay so this is my first time writing Fanfiction...be nice.

Disclaimer: As much as I wish I could I'll probably never own Harry Potter.

The Locket

When Harry was seven he found something important. He really hadn't meant to. In fact it had been completely coincidental.

It had been the day before Dudley's birthday and everybody had been busy preparing for the big event. Or rather, the rest of his family had been watching the telly while he had to clean the rest of the house.

He had just managed to finish the last of his chores. The dishes he had been washing were dried and put away, and Harry had tried to sneak back to his cupboard without being noticed. The fatigue he had gathered after the long day sabotaged his sneaky return though, and with one misplaced step he tripped over one of Dudley's toys. With a wince, he lay there and waited for the loud crash to register with the Dursleys.

"Mum! The freak is out there, and I think he broke one of my toys!" screeched Dudley.

"BOY! What do you think you're doing? Sneaking into bed? I think not, you still have the attic to clean, and don't think you'll get away with breaking Dudley's things! You'll certainly be punished in the morning! Now, off you go!" yelled Vernon, his facing turning an odd purple colour.

Harry glanced at Aunt Petunia to see if she was feeling merciful today but she just looked away with a twitch of her lips. He thought it looked like she wanted to smile, but didn't for some reason. This had always confused Him, the fact that though Dudley and his Uncle were happy to show Harry how much they enjoyed tormenting him Aunt Petunia never showed the same gleeful look on her face when shouting at him.

xxxxxxxxXXXXXXXXXXXxxxxxxxxx 

_A girl of about fourteen sat on her bed, filled with shame. She had really done it, had really messed up. She had revealed her innermost thoughts, the malice-filled whisperings in the back of her head, the ones that whispered that she would never be __**as pretty as her or as smart**__, that __**people would**__**always like her sister**__**better than her**__. Those thoughts that she had tried desperately to push away, to no avail, no matter how many times she tried to ignore them they always came back._

_The tears slipped down her face as she remembered. She could remember the exact moment her sister's jade green eyes had filled with hurt __**"those eyes were always SO much prettier than yours weren't they".**__ She remembered how tears had slipped down her face __**"didn't she look so much more beautiful in pain?"**__ Oh yes, she remembered the exact moment she had called her sister a __**"Freak".**_

xxxxxxxxXXXXXXXXXXXxxxxxxxxx 

Harry was silent as he turned away from them to hide the wetness starting to form in his eyes. Already so tired his limbs felt numb, he stumbled up to the attic. Once he had climbed the small set of stairs leading up to it, he blindly reached out for the door handle with one hand while attempting to rub the sleep out of his eyes with the other.

The door opened with a creek, the darkness in the small, cramped room made it difficult to see in. Harry walked in with tentative steps, grasping for and turning on the light switch mounted on the left wall. The light overtook the space quickly enough to hurt Harry's eyes, which had already adjusted to the dark, and he looked around the room.

To his dismay the tiny attic was stuffed to the brim with boxes and boxes of old photo albums, baby clothes, and books that Dudley had received but never read. He tentatively reached out to grasp the edge of one of the boxes, trying to pull it down so he could start the work that would clearly take all night. With almost no warning the box crashed down, barely missing Harry, and only further adding to the mess he was to tidy up.

Almost full out crying in frustration, Harry grit his teeth and set to work. He began by taking the box that had fallen on its side and righting it before scurrying around trying to pick up the items that had been in the box as quickly as he could.

As he was picking up the old jumpers that Dudley had worn as a 3 year old, and photos of Uncle Vernon on one of his fishing trips, he looked up and saw he was near the back of the small room. He noticed that he was done tidying the mess he had made and decides it would be best to start on the real job before his Uncle came to check.

It took almost an hour to finish the first pile of boxes, Harry knew for certain because there was an old ticking clock on the wall, reminding him every second just how much time he's wasting up here when he could be sleeping. With a sigh he took a break and tried to calculate how much work he had left. The results were less than pleasing; if his estimation was right he wasn't just going to be working all of tonight, but tomorrow as well!

The sheer frustration finally got to him and he kicked at the nearest box, which just happened to be the base of a particularly unbalanced tower of boxes. With a deafeningly loud crash the boxes fell down everywhere.

Harry had closed his eyes when the first box had tumbled down, and he kept them closed now. He was too afraid to open his eyes, too afraid of whether or not his Uncle would be standing menacingly in the doorway when he opened them. One minute passed, then two, and with a sigh of relief he began to open his eyes. The second he opened them though that relief flew from his thoughts. Broken glass from ugly vases littered the floor; photos lay torn on the ground, bereft of their albums. The room was a mess!

Not even Harry could stop the childish tears streaming his eyes, and falling down his cheeks. He had no hope left; he would never be able to fix this mess. With a gaze turned downwards and a heavy heart he began to walk to the exit, hoping to catch some sleep before he was locked in his cupboard for a week.

Something caught his attention when he was nearly at the doorway though, something out of the corner of his eye. He looked to his right so that he could squint and try to see what had glinted in the shadowed corner of the attic. He ran over so to investigate and was surprised at what the disaster had unearthed.

It was a locket, made of porcelain with a picture of a pair of flowers on the front, a lily and a petunia. It looked expensive, custom made even, but as Harry squinted his eyes and looked closer he noticed one flaw. There was a large crack on the front, forever separating the two flowers.

He raised his head and tried to imagine what events had occurred for such a beautiful thing to be confined to this corner. The best he could come up with was that someone had lost it, after all who could throw away something so pretty?

xxxxxxxxXXXXXXXXXXXxxxxxxxxx 

_The girl was about sixteen now and she was sitting in the attic crying. She was curled up with a small locket that she'd had since she was six. Her eyes stung with tears as she clutched that locket to her body like it was something precious, as if it could replace her slowly shattering heart._

_Her sister had just come home and no matter how hard she tried her parent's __**"No Everybody's" **__attention was always on her. The good grades she had worked so hard to get were overshadowed by her sister's near perfect marks __**"Know-it-all"**__. The boy she'd had a crush on for the latter half of the term only interested in when "Her hot sister was coming back", __**"Slut too".**_

_She had come up here to escape her sister's welcome home party from "Her exclusive private school in Scotland", __**"Really just a place to lock up all the freaks so they don't infect**__**us**__**normal people". **__People down there that she had spent nearly two years of school with, who had never once talked to her, were now suddenly treating her sister like they were best friends. Even her own friends had abandoned her for that…that…..that Freak! She had probably put a spell on them! Cursed them or something!_

_With a cry she hurled the locket, once something irreplaceable, at the far wall near the darkest corner of the cramped room. With a loud crack the locket hit the wall, a large crack appearing on it, and fell down behind a pile of boxes._

_Realizing what she had done, she frantically searched behind the boxes, never realizing that it had slipped between two of them. She spent a good hour searching before her parents called her down, tear tracks still gleaming on her face. Her parents never noticed, but an inquisitive pair of beautiful green eyes did. The owner asked her older sister what was wrong but she stayed silent, too ashamed to tell her, and ran up to her room._

_She returned that night, and many others to search for it, but never found it. She spent her days in her room, ignoring her family, too exhausted from her busy nights. She never noticed that she was fraying the already partially torn relationship between her and her sister._

_One person did notice something though, the owner of those green eyes. She noticed on the day she was to leave for school that her sister wasn't wearing her locket. The locket she had given to her sister the week after she had received her letter, the one she had given in exchange for a promise that she would always wear it on the day they had to part, so that they would be able to still be together in a way. That day she left in despair, unwilling to believe that her sister would actually abandon her._

xxxxxxxxXXXXXXXXXXXxxxxxxxxx 

He sat down in the middle of the room so he could get better light and started examining his new treasure. He stroked the front of the locket and admired the sparkling metal of the clasps. Finally he went to open it, feeling as if this piece of jewelry were important, as if he were to cherish every moment with it.

It fell open easily, not surprising considering the lock on it was broken, and Harry could only stare at what was revealed. It was a picture, a picture of an obviously younger Aunt Petunia, and…and a girl with beautiful red hair, and green eyes just like his!

For a moment he could only imagine the possibilities, what if she was related to him! What if she could take him away from the Dursleys! What if she was his Mother?!

He examined the picture again with renewed excitement, staring at the younger girl in particular. She looked young, but older than him, probably about eleven, and Aunt Petunia looked about thirteen. They were both smiling happily, the happiest Harry had ever seen his Aunt really, and side by side holding each other's hands.

Harry reached into the locket to pry at the edge of the photograph, he was going to keep it with him, it just felt too important to just leave there. He was about to put it in his pocket when he noticed the writing on the back and flipped it over.

To Petunia

I know you're sad I'll be leaving so I had this made for you. Since I'll be away for a while, this is so I can make sure you won't forget me! I want you to know that no matter how far away I am or how far away I seem, I'll always be with you.

Love, Lily

Harry could only stare at the message for a while. After he seemed to regain his senses he put the picture back in the locket, stood up, and headed downstairs. He walked to his cupboard, laid down on his cot, and went to sleep, all the while in a sort of daze.

The next morning when his family discover the mess in the attic, they freaked out as expected. Petunia screamed at him for a while with Dudley snickering in the background, after a while she seemed to get tired of it, and let Vernon sentence him to a week in the cupboard, and no food for two days. Harry let it happen, stood there silently until it was over, not arguing back or anything.

They left that day for Dudley's birthday celebration at the amusement park, Harry of course not allowed to go, and it was five minutes after they left, before Harry was sure they were gone, before he moved. He hurriedly dug under his cot until he had fished out his prize. He held the locket tenderly in his hands for while, seemingly thinking about something. After about 40 minutes he seemed to finally make up his mind about something, carefully put the locket back in its hiding place, and tiredly went to sleep.

One week later when he was let out of his prison, he was still quiet. He put up with his Uncle's rant on what would happen to him if something like this ever happened again, and went to do his chores.

That day when he was sent to clean his Aunt and Uncle's room he stopped suddenly by his Aunt's side of the bed. He slowly reached into the pocket of his pants, and pulled something out. He tenderly placed it on his Aunt's pillow before quickly turning around as if it pained him to leave it there and he wanted to get it over with as quickly as possible, like pulling off a band aid. Without another glance back he left the room, silently saying goodbye to the locket he'd abandoned.

xxxxxxxxXXXXXXXXXXXxxxxxxxxx 

_The girl, now a woman with a husband and son, walked up to her room with heavy feet. It had been a tiring day chasing after her son, and she was eager to get some sleep. She knew her Husband was working late so there was no point staying up waiting for him. She wanted to descend into pointless dreams before she had to remember. It was at times like this, exhausted, vulnerable, that they started to creep up on her, the memories of a loved one lost._

_She walked into her bedroom, got ready for bed, and walked over to her side. She was about to forgo all dignity and simply jump in like she had done as a young girl, when she paused lost for words. There on her pillow was a treasure long lost._

_With shaky hands, she reached out to grasp it before holding it protectively against her, tears welling in her eyes. She quickly opened it to make sure it was the right one, and let out a sigh of relief when she saw what was inside. She gave no question to who had put it there, only sent out a prayer of thanks._

_With hurried steps she went to her closet and in the back pulled out a box. It was a beautiful box, made of carved cedar and obviously precious, as she handled it with care. With tender hands she took off the lid and carefully placed the locket inside amongst nick-knacks and books belonging to someone else, and pictures of a girl with long red hair._

_She went to bed that night crying tears of joy, for her tribute to a lost loved one was finally complete. Her tribute to her sister with those beautiful green eyes._

xxxxxxxxXXXXXXXXXXXxxxxxxxxx 

Thanks for reading!

please review, constructive critcism is always welcome!


End file.
